Vimeo beefs up its on-demand video distribution platform

Streaming video service Vimeo is building out its on-demand video distribution platform even more with new pricing options and a handful of new tools for content creators to make money, the company announced yesterday.

Vimeo isn’t anywhere the size of Google-owned YouTube, but it has become the streaming video service that creators of indie films and other video projects tend to prefer. And building off of that community, Vimeo has started offering a handful of its Pro account users and feature film makers the ability to sell their work via Vimeo On Demand.

As of this week, the On Demand platform has more options for people to either rent or buy those premium videos, (and those that purchase videos outright can also download the video file). Additionally, creators can sell preorders of their videos and give out promo codes to help drum up sales and excitement surrounding their release. This might be a particularly good move considering that Vimeo just offered film makers at the Toronto International Film Festival a $10,000 advance if they agreed to exclusively distribute their movie on Vimeo first.

Vimeo’s on-demand platform is also getting updated with new viewer statistics through a dashboard that you’ll see whenever logging into your Vimeo Pro account. While viewer stats seem like they’d be most useful to those producing regular episodic content, the stats dashboard could also show video creators what strategies worked in getting people to actually buy or rent their films.

Overall, this is a smart move for Vimeo and one that certainly puts the company on par with the best video distribution channels online. As long as Vimeo keeps luring in smart creators and indie film makers, this could be a serious distribution channel to watch in the future.